Galaxy Cruise: Royally Screwed: A hilarious sci-fi comedy! by Marcus Alexander Hart

Author:Marcus Alexander Hart [Hart, Marcus Alexander]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Canaby Press, LLC
Published: 2021-09-11T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Tendrils of orange flame lashed the windows of another crappy loaner shuttle as Swooch wrestled it through the outer atmosphere of the planet Bublitz. Beside her, Hax sat at a MonCom console stained with fuzzy black mildew. At the rear of the cramped cockpit, Jassi and Kellybean were strapped into two narrow seats held together with strips of decaying duct tape.

Jassi flapped the neckline of her damp tank top. “Oi, Hax! Crank up the heat shields, will ya?”

“Sorry, buddy. No can do. Two of the reflection modules are leaking coolant.” Hax checked his screen. “But on the plus side, the excessive temperature is killing off the mold in the ventilation system.”

Kellybean sighed. “Well, that’s… comforting?” She turned her body to peer through the small porthole window in the door to the passenger compartment. All the seats were empty, except for two. Prince Stex sat on one side of the narrow aisle in his green uniform. Princess Tyria was on the other, clad in her black body armor. Sweat glistened on their faces as they bobbed and swayed through the shuddering turbulence.

Tyria picked at the crumbling upholstery of her seat. Stex’s dark eyes watched her nimble blue fingers, then drifted up her arm to her long, graceful neck. Tyria’s head subtly turned to venture a glance at the prince. The moment their gaze met, Stex whipped around and looked intently out the window. Tyria scowled and snapped her attention back to her disintegrating cushion.

Kellybean turned away from the porthole and slumped in her seat, squeezing her eyes shut. Things were already going terribly. The royals were clearly miserable. She rubbed her temples and groaned. Jassi’s woody hand rested on her thigh.

“You okay, Beans?”

“Yes. It’s just…” Kellybean’s ears flicked. “The captain ordered us to take our special guests out for a romantic shore excursion. Right now they should be sitting in double-wide velvet recliners and sipping swishberry champagne, not getting their guts scrambled and slow boiled by this piece of junk.” She banged a fist on the wall and an access panel popped open, hinging from the bottom to whack her on the head. “Agh! Dang it!”

Swooch snorted. “You ain’t kiddin’, bro. These spacedock loaners are total buttz.” Her arms trembled as she wrestled the jerking control yoke. “We seriously gotta get us a new shuttle.”

Hax shook his head. “No, what we really need is a Volatine transporter.”

“Oh, yeah!” Swooch said. “Then we wouldn’t have to do orbit drops at all. We could just beam the tourists down to the planets. That would be sweet.”

Kellybean slammed the panel closed. “I’m sorry to break it to you, but Dripley’s so-called ‘transporter’ was nothing but an elaborate scam.”

“Pfft. I know that.” Hax’s eyes smiled. “I wasn’t built yesterday, you silly goose. I meant we have to find a real one.”

“Ugh. There is no real one,” Kellybean said. “It was all just a story made up by a con artist who—” A sonic boom of reentry rattled the ship. The access hatch popped open and cracked Kellybean’s skull.

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